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Thursday, June 8, 2017

The recent floods and landslides are slowly subsiding but its aftermath
and the massive rehabilitation effort that is now required to resurrect
the lives of those affected is proving to be an enormous challenge for
the government and all the agencies concerned.

The disaster left at least 212 persons dead including 44 children and a
further 79 are reported missing. Over 21,000 people are still displaced,
having lost their dwellings and possessions. Nearly 3,000 houses have
been completely destroyed. It is certainly among the more devastating
natural disasters to hit the country in recent years.

The Ratnapura District was the worst affected with 87 confirmed dead and
14 reported missing. More than 13,000 persons in the district are
displaced. About 760 houses have been destroyed with over 5,000 homes
partially damaged. The Kalutara District was the second worst affected
in terms of deaths, with 66 confirmed deaths and 50 listed missing,
according to statistics released from the Disaster Management Centre.

Life is now slowly returning to normal in the flood affected regions
with schools re-opening and rehabilitation getting underway. However
fresh threats of the outbreak of diarrheal and other diseases loom.

Natural disasters

Although the government cannot be blamed for natural disasters, there
was a political fallout in the wake of the floods and landslides with
the Opposition questioning the government’s preparedness to handle the
crisis- as well as the absence of key personalities from the country.

While it could be argued that the authorities could have been better
prepared to deal with floods and landslides, officials have responded
saying that the scale of the disaster- with a vast extent of the country
and a large number of people affected- was such that preparations fell
short of what was required and what was predicted.

Sri Lanka’s worst natural disaster was the 2004 Tsunami where 35,000
people perished in a matter of minutes. However, that was a disaster
where access to those affected was readily available soon after the
disaster- and the relief effort could get underway straight away. The
recent floods were different as roads remained impassable for days,
hampering the relief effort and putting more lives at risk.

Another question that is being raised is why, in this day and age of
advanced technology, the disaster could not be predicted. Had that been
done, those in the flood and landslide prone areas could have been
forewarned and evacuated, preventing deaths even if damage to property
cannot be avoided. Indeed, it has been pointed out that other countries
frequently encounter similar disasters of greater magnitude, yet escape
fatalities because they are better prepared.

As the disaster unfolded, it was President Maithripala Sirisena and
Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe who took the lead in co-ordinating
the rescue effort. They held regular, round the clock meetings with
officials to ensure that relief was on the way as fast as circumstances
allowed.
New vehicles for ministers

However, the government came in for some flak as the floods hit around
the same time as Parliament debated the import of new vehicles for
ministers. This appeared insensitive at best and attracted much
criticism, especially on social media.

The government was to defer the decision to import these vehicles until
funds had been allocated for those displaced by the floods but this
decision didn’t get a fraction of the publicity that the news about the
import of vehicles generated. As a result, the government was left with
some explaining to do.

There was also much angst about the absence of Prime Minister Ranil
Wickremesinghe, days after the disaster unfolded. Prior to his departure
for the United States, Wickremesinghe worked tirelessly, overseeing the
rescue effort and ensuring that everything possible was being done to
make life easier for the displaced.

However, when he left the country, it was conveyed that he was on a
‘private visit’ to the United States. This led to a backlash in the
media, with cartoonists having a field day showing the Prime Minister
flying away on an aircraft waving to those marooned by the floods. In
hindsight, it appears that the Prime Minister’s office missed an
opportunity to inform the public of the circumstances of his visit,
because that would have allayed the criticism.

Prime Minister Wickremesinghe’s visit was for medical investigations and
treatment. He had been advised to do so for many months now but had
been postponing this due to official commitments. He had then been
advised that to postpone his visit further would be detrimental to his
health.

No one would grudge the Prime Minister receiving medical treatment but
by the time his office made known the reasons for his overseas visit,
some damage had been done. Prime Minister Wickremesinghe himself later
took to social media to clarify the situation, tweeting “My sincere
thanks for the numerous messages I received since I had to leave Sri
Lanka for a long overdue medical check-up; I regret I was unable to
continuously be on ground as I have in the past. Prior to leaving I put
in place the overall disaster management mechanisms and have been
receiving relevant reports on a six hourly basis”.

Also at the receiving end was Disaster Management Minister Anura
Priyadarshana Yapa. Minister Yapa was away in Mexico attending
-ironically- a conference on disaster management but did not return to
the country immediately.

Now back in Sri Lanka, Minister Yapa defended his decision to remain in
Mexico at the height of the disaster. “I went to Mexico to represent Sri
Lanka and I was also holding the position of co-chairman. I knew that
my deputy minister as well as the rest of the ministry officials along
with other government departments and the military was responding well
to the disaster situation. I made daily calls to stay updated on the
developments and gave instructions from Mexico. I worked hard to wrap up
as soon as possible and returned four days earlier than planned,” Yapa
told the media on his return. While what the Minister says maybe
accurate, it would have been prudent for him to return sooner because he
is now being accused of being insensitive at best- and selfish at
worst.
Cabinet reshuffle

Interestingly, former President Mahinda Rajapaksa, who made some public
comments about the government’s lack of preparedness for the floods,
also left the country on a visit to Japan at the invitation of a
Buddhist organisation there. This too has attracted much criticism- and
Rajapaksa certainly cannot claim that he was visiting overseas for
medical treatment or on official duties. What this also means is that
the Joint Opposition (JO), of which he is the de fact leader, cannot
criticise the government as much as it would like to do.

The government could also have done without the swearing in of four
deputy ministers and four state ministers at the height of the floods
crisis. This was a sequel to the Cabinet reshuffle days earlier but it
led to the allegation that while hundreds have died and thousands have
been displaced, all the government was concerned about was swearing in
new ministers. Given the context of the unfolding crisis, it would have
been better had the swearing in of these ministers been postponed. As it
has been already pointed out, if the Cabinet reshuffle could be delayed
for months on end, surely the swearing in of junior ministers could
have been delayed for a few more days?

Nevertheless, the disaster has prompted the government to rethink its
strategies vis-à-vis natural calamities. Minister Anura Priyadarshana
Yapa revealed that the government was considering laws to enable
forcible evacuation and also laws to ban cultivation of crops along the
mountain slopes, in order to prevent landslides in the future.

The government has also come up with novel measures- such as providing
electricity free of charge for six months- to assist the flood and
landslide victims but the rehabilitation effort will need to be
sustained with the same intensity over the next few months.

Parliament will debate the disaster tomorrow where there will always be
bickering about who did what and what could have been done better, but
if ever there was a redeeming feature in the calamity, it was the
overwhelmingly generous response from the general public towards the
relief effort that shone through as a silver lining amidst the darks
clouds of disaster and despair.